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The study examines how insurgent violence influenced electoral manipulation during Afghanistan's 2009 presidential election. Using a forensic 'last-digit' test validated by a physical recount, the authors find an inverted-U shaped relationship: moderate violence increases fraud by limiting the presence of election observers, but extreme violence decreases fraud by disrupting the loyalty networks required to manipulate results. The analysis further distinguishes between the incumbent and the challenger, finding that the challenger's fraud exhibits 'spatial displacement'—shifting to neighboring districts when local violence is too high—whereas the incumbent's fraud, tied to official state apparatus, does not.